Smoking Chimpanzee

There's a zoo chimp in South Africa that picked up a smoking habit from his human admirers:

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AHN) – South African zoo workers are working to find a way for their star chimpanzee to quit smoking.

Charlie, a grown male chimp at the Bloemfontein Zoo, has been picking up cigarettes thrown to him by visitors and smoking them. Zoo officials blame the habit on its visitors, stating the chimp probably picked up the habit after mimicking the humans he saw daily.

"Baby chimps pick up habits by mimicking adults and we think he started mimicking smokers at his enclosure which probably led to smokers throwing him cigarettes," says zoo spokesman Daryl Barnes.

Charlie is already showing the signs of a true nicotine addict. "He even acts like a naughty schoolboy by hiding the cigarette when staff approach the area," Barnes said, adding that the zoo was determined to help him quit.

This is pretty humorous. Obviously chimps are smart because they discovered how to look cool.

Apparently there are other chimps in zoos around the world who have also evolved this trait.

+ cigs =

[edit on 4/14/2005 by djohnsto77]

What a perfect and terrible example of what NOT to do.

Feed 'em, they'll scavenge and become violent trying to get food. Toss em butts, and they'll light one up.

I mean, come on, we have enough humans to trick into doing it, do we need to move down the food chain. He's already in a zoo, it's hard enough for him!

Where theres a dollar to be made...

I tried smoking Chimpanzee, but it just didn't get me high or anything. Most of the time, the smokes I'd roll were too wet and stank something awful. It's about as effective as tulips; I don't recommend it.